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[previous article] [next article]David Gardner
So you've sat down at your workstation and fired up Mosaic for a session of net surfing. Only one problem--you don't know where to start! You've heard your friends talk about the "really cool pictures" at JPL (Jet Propulsion Laboratory) or the "incredible" list of links in the Mother-of-all BBS, but you need some help navigating there. Never fear! The following is a list of suggested starting points for effectively traveling the information superhighway:
First things first. To get a sense not only of where to go but what kind of people you can expect to meet, try the following newsgroups for a taste of the Web community:
The newsgroups alt.internet.services, comp.internet.net-happenings, and news.answers are particularly good sources for URLs (Uniform Resource Locators) to various WWW sites, as well as Gopher servers, mailing lists, and new newsgroups. Of the three, the first two are geared largely towards announcing new resources on the Net, while the third combines the periodically released FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) for each newsgroup into one convenient location. Among these FAQs, you may find the occasional reference to an interesting URL. The remaining newsgroups center on discussion of WWW events and politics and make for a useful introduction to the Web community.
There are undoubtedly dozens of mailing lists which provide useful information to net surfers but none more so than the InterNIC Scout Report. Released once a week, the Scout Report provides a concise listing of new URLs, mailing lists, and various net happenings which are of interest to subscribers. For instance, in one week's issue, listings for new URLs at the CIA, the IRS, and Jet Propulsion Laboratory could be found, along with an update on the National Information Infrastructure (or "information superhighway"). To subscribe to the Scout Report, send email to the following address: majordomo@is.internic.net. In the body of the message, type: subscribe scout-report. You should begin receiving the report once a week thereafter.
Remember to retain your original message from any "Mailing List" subscription. Usually this message contains instructions on how to unsubscribe! Believe me, someday these instructions on how to unsubscribe will indeed prove useful. After receiving mailings for a while, you may discover that the material provided is of no interest to you OR you might find it impossible to keep up with the massive amounts of reading material some of these mailing lists send.
These four sites include links to literally thousands of other locations, sorted by category. So if your fancy is art, there are likely several museums online from which to choose, while if astronomy is more to your liking, there are dozens of observatories to explore.
Together, these three areas give you a broad array of tools from which to choose to start your surfing. Fortunately, net surfing begets more net surfing, as your list of options expands almost beyond limit the more exploring you do. In fact, half the fun lies in discovering new and interesting sites not necessarily listed in all the customary resources.
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